Bernard’s nightmare hard to shake

Canada's skip Cheryl Bernard (right) and third Susan O'Connor (left) monitor action during the women's Olympic curling gold medal game between Canada and Sweden at the Vancouver Olympic Centre during the Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Friday, February 26, 2010.

Photograph by: Ric Ernst
, Canwest News Service

VANCOUVER — It was for, Cheryl Bernard, a sleepless night.

“Not good,” said the Team Canada skip on Saturday morning, half a day removed from missing shots in both the 10th and 11th ends that would have given her team a gold medal against Sweden’s Anette Norberg. “I threw those shots over and over again, and I made them every time.”

Trouble was, she made them in her mind. On the ice, where it counted, she missed them and the Swedes escaped with a 7-6 extra-end victory.

The healing process for Bernard, third Susan O’Connor, second Carolyn Darbyshire and lead Cori Bartel began Saturday; they attended an early afternoon media conference, and O’Connor, Darbyshire, Bartel and alternate Kristie Moore attended the men’s gold-medal game as guests of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, but for the most part, it was a day spent decompressing with family and trying to deal with a lingering case of the what-ifs.

In the 10th end, Bernard had an open hit for the victory, and the smile she had on her face as she let the rock go told you she was right on the broom. Except the rock didn’t do what she and O’Connor expected it to do, and failed to curl enough to avoid a jam, and Norberg made an open hit to score two and force extra ends.

In the 11th, Bernard had, in her words, a “routine” double takeout for the win, but her rock overcurled by a fraction and didn’t remove both Swedish stones.

“I threw it good (in the 10th end), I threw it where we thought the ice was. But nobody had thrown there and it didn’t do anything,” said Bernard. “We were shocked. But you know what? I can live with the shot in the 10th. It was an icing thing (positioning the target broom), and, OK, you miss the ice sometimes, and I didn’t figure out, and that’s my job.

“But the one in frickin’ 11? That’s the juiciest double you could ever look at, and I make ’em 100 times. Just a little bit tight, and that’s the piss-off.”

Yes, there will be some regrets — “Well, I wish we would have taken less ice in 10 (for Bernard’s takeout),” said O’Connor with a rueful laugh on Saturday — and the pain will linger. But at least, said O’Connor, there was nothing left on the ice when the Canadians left the Vancouver Olympic Centre on Friday night.

“Well, it still sucks, but we couldn’t have done anything more,” she said. “If you felt like we hadn’t prepared enough or we were in a poor mental state, then we’d have something to be disappointed about. But there was nothing more we could have done.”

The Calgary team plans to take some time away from curling — it pulled out of the Asham World Curling Tour’s Bear Mountain Classic in Victoria earlier this week — before returning for the season-ending Grand Slam Players’ Championships in mid-April in Dawson Creek, B.C.

Next season, the team will play in the Canada Cup later this year in Medicine Hat, Alta., and the Continental Cup next January in St. Albert, Alta.; anything beyond that is up in the air.

During Friday night’s post-game news conference, O’Connor told reporters that Bernard was the reason the team made it as far as it did, a statement that left Bernard in tears.

“To have missed those shots and hear those comments that quickly after the game? They’re just classy people,” said Bernard on Saturday. “I pulled them aside after the news conference and told them, ‘I am so sorry,’ and they just said, ‘Cheryl, you know what? All the shots you made all year got us to these Games.’ They are just amazing people.”

Spotlights

Canada's skip Cheryl Bernard (right) and third Susan O'Connor (left) monitor action during the women's Olympic curling gold medal game between Canada and Sweden at the Vancouver Olympic Centre during the Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Friday, February 26, 2010.

Photograph by: Ric Ernst, Canwest News Service

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